I am probably the most militant (maybe second after Chad) person on the thread, so it really hurt me to think of this post… but it had to happen. I’ve lived in LA for about 9 and a half months now. It’s been an interesting adventure. There have been a lot of ups and downs during this journey as I’m in a very interesting situation. Right now, I am my boss’s only employee, so it’s been kind of hard meeting peers. And after the week I had, I decided to write this blog.

While trying to meet new people, I have realized that black women are the unfriendliest women (at least in LA). As I’ve had many encounters here, I’ve been surprised how various women have responded to me. I have a friend from college that I’ve been hanging out with. She’s friendly. She’s spunky. She’s accepting, and she’s white… So we go to a lot of bars and have wine nights watching Pitch Perfect. But being who I am, I can say I do crave [doing hoodrat things] with my friends, so I did go on a search to find some black friends. What did I decide to do? I joined the LA Urban League Young Professionals.

I went to my first event this past week. I was excited. I have a magnetic personality. I’m funny. I have to meet one friend, right? As I lightly campaigned about just moving here and made small talk, every single female ended up giving me the “we already have our friends leave us alone” stank face. I would join conversations, and these females would literally turn their lip up at me. Really? It wasn’t even about bourgie black people perceiving that I was less than because I clearly just paid dues. So why look at me like this? My jokes were funny. I even had the comedian laughing, so I questioned why I left the event feeling awkward, bruised, and empty handed.

The next night… I go out with my spunky, LA best friend, and a couple of her ex co-workers (one Caucasian, one Asian-American). We hit a nice, dance infused, spot. Mostly black people. I got to shake my lovely lady lump. The downside of this place? It was the upstairs of a restaurant and only had one, unisex bathroom. If you know me, you know that I am the bathroom queen and probably will go 3 or 4 times during the night. (It’s probably because I drink so fast… don’t judge me!) While in this abyss of a restroom line, a Latina taps me and tells me how pretty I look in my shirt. We then strike up a conversation. She recognizes my accent, and I tell her that I haven’t lived here for long. She then invites me out to a comedy night. We exchange numbers. (She was in line with her boyfriends, so she wasn’t hitting on me). A simple bathroom trip, and I gain an associate. Interesting.

I wish I had some profound logic as to why black women are the way we are, but I don’t. We get in our groups, and we treat encounters like they are twerk team auditions. I’m not being a pot calling the kettle black, but I am now aware of what we as black women do. And if we do it to women, many of us wonder why no men approached us at the club. We’re missing God’s blessing by being so unfriendly, so I’m challenging myself to smile at everyone and not give someone a stank face when they try to have a conversation with me. Let’s see what will happen! #BlackPower

I come to you today realizing there is a paradigm in Black Hollywood, and I don’t know how I feel about it. This realization comes after the backlash of Mary J. Blige’s Burger King Commercial.

Click Here to Watch the Video

Many believe it was coonish for Blige to sing the song about chicken, burgers, and even ranch dressing, but as I sit on the other side of the industry, my gut just wouldn’t let me get as mad as I probably would have a few years ago. My mind didn’t directly move to disgust and dissecting the “issue”, but it DID make me wonder about the meeting Blige had with her team. I could picture her agent presenting the opportunity her. It was probably like, “Burger King wants you to do a song.” If I came to you and plainly said, “Burger King wants you to do a song,” would you honestly shut it down? Would chicken and ranch dressing be the first thing to pop into your mind? Maybe not, so let’s just say that you agreed. Once you read the lyrics, even if a red flag was raised, what would the conversation be like with your manager about the backlash of your career? Before you answer, let me tell you that commercials make people a lot of money for a little time. While movie shoots would probably last 100 days, a commercial lasts 3. While making an album may last months or even years, you would probably spend a day in the studio to record the song. And the residuals for a national commercial bring in some nice bread… very nice. So think about the complexity of her decision especially when the digital boom has cut musical artists’ income.

But trust, Blige is not alone in the struggle. Think about Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer. With the scarcity of parts, should [black] actors turn down roles? Did people stop working for BP waiting on them to clean up the spill? Did the LAPD officers quit the force after those police officers were acquitted for beating Rodney King? So as we wait for more quality television shows and movies, what do black artist do in the mean time while whites offer a narrow scope of characters and blacks don’t take the time to educate themselves in order to create quality work? Artists still need income, and inactivity is the best way to be forgotten. How does Black Hollywood deal with this paradigm?

Honestly, the resolution of this paradigm doesn’t bother me as much as the realization that we are dealing with the same predicament Robert Townsend dealt with in HollywoodShuffle. It’s been at least 30 years, and we really haven’t progressed. I’ve racked my brain trying to find solutions to this problem. Each solution seems to cancel each other out, and in the time of quick, fast, and in a hurry products (reality tv), it’s so hard to find someone willing to take their time and make something of quality. To be transparent, The Game and Let’s Stay Together are a chore to watch, and I won’t even get on Love That Girl. No one supports Treme resulting next season being their last season, and after Red Tails, it seems we cannot rely on someone else to tell our story. We are slowly getting mainstream roles, but “they” protest. For example, the backlash of Idris Elba in the movie Thor: http://herocomplex.latimes.com/2011/05/02/thor-star-idris-elba-on-fan-racism-and-ghost-rider-sequel-but-not-prometheus/, or recently the African Americans casted in Hunger Games: http://www.usmagazine.com/entertainment/news/hunger-games-fans-have-racist-debate-over-stars-playing-rue-thresh-2012263 ? So in this slow transformation, what do we do… because BILLS are do!

Be sure to check out our first ThreadRadio show TONIGHT at 10pm Central/11pm Eastern! We’ll be discussing the difference between making love and having sex…if there is one. Join us! If you can’t listen tonight, we’ll post it here on the blog.

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Social Justice- the fight for awareness and tolerance of all cultures and social groups. Social Justice can do a lot to help as well as harm certain causes. The Civil Rights Movement has propelled African Americans and many other underrepresented groups (especially white women) to be recognized as not having the same opportunities and rights as their counterparts of power. Since the Civil Rights Movement, the tactics such as marches and protest have been desensitized limiting the power of their abilities to mobilize and communicate to the masses the unjust that certain groups may be experiencing. For this reason, advocates have had to be innovative in their tactics to express their concerns. Many examples of this have been facebook and twitter campaigns as well as walkouts and boycotts of businesses. The most recent way of acknowledging an oppressed group that has caught my attention as been the recent phenomenon of the “Angry Birds” creators. Read the rest of this entry »

I understand that I have neglected my blog duties and focused on another. I apologize, but I have finally found a post that I was motivated to write. I won’t tell you where or when I decided to write this blog (trust me. You don’t want to know), but I thought it would be nice… and funny.

There are many times in your life when you have that crucial eureka moments. The ah ha’s are sometimes laughable when the realization or solutions have been right in front of your face. So here is a list of “the moment when…” incidents that you may have experienced.

The moment when… you realize that your cell phone is at home, and you’re too far to turn back around.

The moment when… you pour cereal into the bowl and realize you have no milk.

The moment when… you get in the shower then you have to go to the restroom.

The moment when… you’re studying for a test and realize it’s the wrong chapter.

The moment when… you continuously search for your phone then realize you’re on it.

The moment when… you a movie you’re watching gets really good then your dvr tells you that two of your favorite shows are set to record.

The moment when… you wake up and realize your alarm is going off in one minute.

The moment when… you’re going hard on someone and find out the stranger sitting next to you knows the person very well.

The moment when… you’re about to retweet someone, and you realize it would be too messy.

The moment when… you look for the “like” button on twitter.

The moment when… you look for the “retweet” button on facebook.

The moment when… you sit on the toilet and realize there’s no toilet paper.

The moment when… you’re going hard on that song and notice someone’s been standing there the whole time.

The moment when… you pick up the soda can and are surprised that there’s nothing left.

The moment when… you open the fridge and realize someone has eaten your food.

The moment when… you applied for graduation.

The moment when… we won the national championship

The moment when… you pull up and realized you forgot the one thing you went to the store for.

The moment when… you think this is the worst birthday ever, then you open up that last gift!!!!

That moment when… you change that class to pass/fail.

The moment when… you meet your friend’s sig fig, and they’re not as cute as you imagined.

The moment when… you realize Purple Rain is on tv.

The moment when… you finally delete someone’s number.

The moment when… you see three missed calls or text and none of them are from anyone you want to hear from.

The moment when… you realize God has really blessed you with a great group of friends!